A Pair of Tights
About A Pair of Tights
Anita and Marion are broke and hoping for a dinner when Marion's boyfriend brings his boss over. The men will not pay for a meal. They stop at an ice-cream parlor instead, and Marion is sent in with a few coins for four cones. Swinging doors, a ventilator, a boy at an upstairs window, and a policeman who will not let the car sit at the curb destroy one batch of ice cream after another. The argument turns into a street brawl, the sort of finish Hal Roach used often that year.
Cast & crew
More about A Pair of Tights
Hal Yates directed and Hal Roach produced. H. M. Walker wrote the titles, Art Lloyd photographed, and William Terhune edited. Leo McCarey supervised. The script had been aimed at Laurel and Hardy, who were busy, so it was recast. Filming ran September 19–28, 1928. It was the third and last short pairing Anita Garvin with Marion Byron, after Feed 'em and Weep and Going Ga-ga.
Themes
Background
It is one of the last silent comedies from the Roach lot, released with a music-and-effects track as sound shorts were taking the market.
Making
Garvin was tall and Byron, nicknamed Peanuts, was small. Roach used that contrast the way he built other teams, then dropped the pairing after three shorts.
Look
Art Lloyd shot it on the studio's New York street, with long held takes in the apartment and fast cuts once the cones start falling.
Music
Late silent release prints carry a synchronized score and effects. There is no dialogue.
Preservation
A complete print survives.
Notes
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer distributed it. The copyright date is December 10, 1928.
- A title card calls the two men tightwads and says Jimmy Valentine could not open their pockets.
- Edgar Kennedy and Stuart Erwin play the boss and the boyfriend. Spec O'Donnell is the boy who starts the fight.
- One static shot of Kennedy beside Garvin at the piano runs 56 seconds.
- Randy Skretvedt, watching a Blu-ray, counted 38 ice creams dropped or smashed.
- Feed 'em and Weep and Going Ga-ga survive only in part. This short is complete.
Scenes
- Marion comes out of the parlor and loses the cones to the swinging door.
- A boy upstairs and then his father join a war of thrown ice cream.
- The policeman keeps moving the car while the others wait.
